You hear that sound? A little subtle, eh? Well, it’s cotton on cotton. That’s me turning my pockets inside out and shrugging my shoulders. Bottom scraped, my friends.
What happened with Big Green‘s massive coin salvage program? Well, all of the jars and old sofas have given up their treasure, and the booty is already spent. That’s right – we pulled together about $47, all of which went to the electric company. (No, I don’t mean the children’s television program from the 1970’s… I mean the fuckers who keep the lights on.) Then there was that fiver that Marvin (my personal robot assistant) found lying around the forge room. I don’t want you to think we’re turning on each other in our hour of need, but I will admit that there was a minor tussle over that bill. Mostly it was Marvin (who was too clueless to let it go) and anti-Lincoln (who was determined to get an absinthe over at the local watering hole), but before long we were all involved, flailing away like drunks, growling like mad dogs over a stolen soup bone. A pitiable sight, to be sure.
Yes indeed. Anti-Lincoln got his absinthe, for all the good it did him. (He’s mad already, I tell you…. MAD.) Once we all regained feelings in our extremities, we tried to take collective stock of our position. Not a very promising one. Matt asked Mitch Macaphee if he could invent some money – that drew a snarky look, and we all went silent. Most of 
our ideas had gone flat. The portraits with Lincoln didn’t pan out. People refused to believe he actually was Lincoln. I think it was because we had one Lincoln on both ends of town. (We nuked our own credibility on that one, I’m afraid.) There was a suggestion – I think it may have come from me – that we put the man-sized tuber up for sale, but that didn’t fly either. (The bottom fell out of the tuber market months ago.) It seemed as though the only thing left was to start searching for honest remunerative employment. Odd jobs, perhaps. Like bending pretzels and raising alligators. (Apologies to Mad comics.)
Then it struck us. Why don’t we try that thing that Dr. Smith did on Lost In Space when the Robinson’s went away and left him in charge of the Jupiter 2? (Need help on that? Oh, all right…) We can rent the abandoned Cheney Hammer 
Mill out as a luxury resort hotel! Apart from the luxury, we have everything we need. I could print tickets. Matt could borrow some floral umbrellas from the local sporting goods store. John could stop by the lumber yard and pick up some groceries. We could rename the mill something like “Falcon’s Harbor” or “Happy Acres”, even though there’s no harbor and there are no acres. (It’s what’s called the “Pelican Cove” principle, after a planned community by that name that had neither pelicans nor a cove.) We could start selling reservations on the internets – just post a message on any old site and patrons will flock toward us like lemmings. It’s just that easy.
Or maybe not. But it beats working. Got better ideas? Send ’em here.
